negation of religion, they do not justify an adherence to its
traditional form. The far-reaching changes of life that we are aware of
cannot possibly be explained away or their significance lessened; they
must be estimated, and brought into relation with religion. The boundary
between the eternal and the temporal, the substance and the outward form
in religion, has been made uncertain by these changes; in particular
they forbid philosophy to treat the religious problem from the point of
view of a dogmatic confession. The antithesis between Catholicism and
Protestantism is the offspring of an age that preceded the development
of modern culture, with all its deep-reaching revolutions. The main
problem of religion at the time when the antithesis made its appearance
was differently stated from the way in which we now state it. For then
it was a question whether Christianity was to be formed from society or
from personality; while to-day Christianity fights for its existence as
a whole, and must defend its fundamental truths against a time in which
activity is directed into other paths. The present antithesis cannot
possibly be regarded as ultimately identical with the former one; and it
is for this reason impossible to take up the present conflict concerning
religion under the banner of a particular dogmatic confession. Such an
ante-dating of the conflict also has the disadvantage that it prevents
the great antitheses which are involved to-day both in Catholicism and
Protestantism from being clearly displayed. Two different streams have
been present in Catholicism from its beginning: to the one, the power of
the ecclesiastical system is the main thing; while to the other, on the
contrary, the religious disposition is of supreme importance. The
influences of modern culture have increased this difference, both
directly and indirectly, and, chiefly outside of Germany, there are
signs of the beginning of a stronger movement towards a more inward
Catholicism. Protestantism carries within it an antithesis of the old
ecclesiastical form of religion, which adheres as much as possible to
the state of things in the sixteenth century, and a form transformed by
the Idealism in modern culture more into the universal, the free, the
purely human, but also not infrequently into vagueness and superficial
optimism. But so long as the bitterness of sectarian prejudice diverts
the attention of men from the chief thing, these antitheses are not
clearly expressed and energetically developed. There are serious
contradictions involved in these views of religion, and they cannot be
developed without giving rise to parties. Philosophy must strive with
all its energy to bring it about that these parties shall be formed in
relation to the present situation, and not from the point of view of a
past age; and that the conflict shall be raised to a higher level, to
truth and greatness, by bringing itself into relation with the needs of
the age.
The task of philosophy is not limited to estimating as impartially as
possible the state of things as we immediately experience it; that task
also includes a positive treatment of the religious problem. That which
is characteristic in the philosophy of life advocated in this treatise,
Noëtism, as it might be called, must also find a definite expression and
show what capacity it has, in the fulfilment of this task. In accordance
with its fundamental relation to history, which has been much discussed,
Noëtism cannot make history most important, even in religion, and cannot
read into history as much as possible of what the present demands; it
must regard any such procedure as a weakness and a half-truth. Noëtism
must insist upon religion's justifying itself and establishing its
reality before the tribunal of the spiritual life: only then can the
truth that exists in history and that which, through progressive
differentiation, promotes the cause of transcendent truth and brings it
nearer to humanity as a whole, be elucidated. We have not for a moment
lost sight of the fact that it is essential to religion to be related
not to single individuals but to all; and that religion can evolve no
power without compelling men to some kind of unity.
Now, for the treatment of the religious problem, Noëtism offers first a
position from which demands are made compatible which are otherwise
directly opposed to one another. Religion is concerned with experiences
which at one and the same time must possess a universal character,
belong to our own life, and be immediately accessible to each. The
attempt of speculative philosophy to establish religion by deduction
from the nature of the whole has the required universal character; but
it introduces religion to the soul from outside, and remains a mere
intellectual gain. The contrary attempt to base religion in the
individual soul developed an inwardness; but this attempt shows that the
soul does not know how to build up a world and to contrast it with the
subject, to present this world as something transcendent; it makes no
sure progress beyond the fluctuation and undulation of feeling. Only an
independent spiritual life, inwardly present to us, elevates us above
this division of subjective feeling and a transcendent world, and
inaugurates universal experiences in our own domain. How with the
spiritual life new realities are manifested; how a world-whole which
transcends human existence becomes evident, has already been discussed,
and it is not necessary to make any repetition here. Every
acknowledgment of an independent spiritual life is favourable to
religion in so far as this acknowledgment makes us clearly perceive the
inadequacy, the illusoriness, and the vanity of all narrowly human
conduct and occupation, its futility in matters both small and great. So
long as attention is fixed on individual matters, and so long as we may
expect some improvement in these in the present or in the future, we
may not be aware of the futility of this conduct; but as soon as the
situation is grasped as a whole and estimated as a whole, such human
conduct is found to be entirely inadequate, these external aids are
found wanting, and there remains only the inexorable "either--or":
either the power of a new world is operative in man, and makes him
strong outwardly and inwardly, or the whole life of man is spiritually
lost--one great delusion, one great error.
If from the point of view of the spiritual life the contour of a new
world is acquired, we may turn back to history, and ask how far it
indicates a movement which tends in the direction of such a world. The
spiritual life itself brings a distinctive standard for this inquiry:
the fundamental fact is not a single factor within life, but the
existence of a self-conscious whole of life, of a spiritual process
itself. From the point of view of the spiritual life, the chief thing in
religions will be the kind of life they reveal; what they make of the
life-process; how through the relation to an absolute life they evolve
the life-process to a higher stage. Only so far as they express this
life-process, and not in themselves, are the doctrines and practices of
religion of value.
If we apply this test to the individual religions, Christianity
distinctly shows itself to be far superior to the others. More than any
of the other religions, Christianity fulfils the demands which are made
by the nature of the spiritual life and its relation to the world; and
so far as Christianity satisfies these demands, but not in its
historical form as a whole, it may assert itself to be absolute.
If Christianity as a religion of redemption requires that we should tear
ourselves from the old world and aspire to a new one, this demand
receives a distinctive significance by the more detailed conception
which Christianity forms of it. As evil and that which is to be overcome
is regarded not, as among the Hindus, as mere appearance, but as moral
guilt, which disorganises the world, it is not the fundamental reality
of the world but a particular conception of it that is rejected; and so
there remains the possibility of life being given a positive character;
and in this the main thing is not intellectual enlightenment, but
radical moral renewal, an elevation into a world of love, grace, and
reverence. This view of the world makes it impossible to base life
simply upon affirmation or negation; but affirmation and negation must
be present within it, and thus life is given an inner comprehensiveness
and an inner movement which it would not otherwise possess. Christianity
included the innermost basis of human life in this movement and
transformation, since it not only regarded the divine as influencing the
human by individual manifestations of its power, but proclaimed a
complete union of both, and maintained this through its whole
development. A wearied and exhausted age may have formulated this
fundamental truth in the most unfortunate manner in the doctrine of the
divine humanity of Christ; nevertheless, the effectiveness of the truth
involved was not prevented by this. Only from the power of a conception
of a union of the divine and the human can religion acquire the
character of pure and complete inwardness, of a spiritual
self-consciousness: otherwise the relation of the divine and the human
remains a more or less external one. But this is not the place to trace
how the Christian type of life has been visibly embodied in the course
of history in the personality and the life of its founder, and in the
common labours of centuries, in which the Semitic and Germanic natures
have been harmonised, and great peoples and personalities have given
their best to the world: here we may only remark further that the whole
is not a work completed at one particular point in time, but a
continuous task of all ages; and that, in the fundamental life
transcending all mere time, a fixed standard is offered by which to test
the achievement of all particular ages, and to differentiate the results
of the work of history as far as they correspond with the fundamental
character of religion. Religion must maintain the fundamental character
of the life that it advocates, in face of all change in the state of
culture, just as decidedly as for its development in detail it remains
dependent upon the help of the work of culture.
Religion in the present, therefore, has great and difficult tasks. For
one thing, religion must energetically maintain the supremacy, in
opposition to modern culture, of the type of life that it advocates. The
fact that there are points of direct antagonism between the religious
type of life and modern culture ought neither to be denied nor in any
way obscured. On the one hand, we have an ideal of a life of the pure
inwardness of ethical disposition; on the other, the ideal of spiritual
power: in the former the tendency is to personal, in the latter to
impersonal life: in the one case there is a positive development only by
a complete transformation; in the other the immediate impulse of life is
the ruling motive power of the whole. It shows only superficiality and
confusion to seek an agreeable compromise between these antitheses; for,
in truth, either the one or the other must assume the guidance of the
whole. The whole course of our investigation permits of no doubt as to
our own attitude in this matter.
But it is impossible to defend the supremacy of the type of life
advocated by Christianity without recognising the necessity that this
type of life must be in a form which appropriates to itself the long
experience of humanity and corresponds to the present stage of spiritual
evolution. The changes necessitated by this evolution are far too great
for the traditional form of Christianity to be able to express them; in
order to develop their own power, and to establish themselves
triumphantly in opposition to a hostile world, they must acquire an
independent form for themselves.
There are three kinds of changes that are especially necessary to the
form of Christianity in the present. (1) The representation of the world
found in the older form of Christianity has become absolutely untenable:
in this matter we must not seek weak compromises between the old and the
new, but without fear we must fully acknowledge the elements of fact
that exist in the new. We cannot do this unless we make deep changes in
the way we regard religion; we must find the courage and the power for
such a renewal. (2) The whole movement of modern life has made us feel
that the realities with which traditional religion has to do are far too
insignificant and too narrow; a rigid insistence upon them threatens to
involve us in a degeneration to the narrowly human and subjective. The
conceptions of "inwardness," "personality," and "morality," in
particular, need to be interpreted more comprehensively and deeply; the
soul's "being for self" must be based upon a self-consciousness of the
spiritual life. Religion must take up the conflict with the world
spiritually, and through this grow in greatness in its whole effect and
government. (3) The older form of Christianity was the product of an
exhausted and faint-spirited age; hence its fundamental attitude is
predominantly passive and negative. It shows a strong tendency to
depreciate human nature, and to leave the salvation of man entirely to
God's mercy: in emphasising man's redemption from evil it is apt to
forget the elevation of his nature toward the good. The joyousness of
the Christian life is insufficiently dwelt upon; and the raising of men
from their prostration and perplexities falls short of a restoration to
a free and self-determining activity. What is needed is a thorough-going
reconstruction which shall emphasise the importance of action and
joyousness in Christian morality, without in any way weakening the
opposition to all systems of natural morality based on the rights of
force.
In a word, with all respect to Christianity, we demand its expression in
a new form. We require that Christianity shall identify itself more
definitely with a religion of the spiritual life as opposed to a
religion which merely ministers to human frailty, and that it shall show
greater decision in casting off the antiquated accessories that hamper
its movement. We ask that it shall make prominent those simple and
fundamental features of its system which have value for all time, and in
this way restore sincerity and settled confidence to life. We can
hardly expect that the reunion of man on a religious basis will take
place all at once, but it would be a great gain if we could only clearly
realise what the oppositions are which still keep us apart. Such insight
would help to check that insincerity in religious matters which must
first be got rid of, if there is to be any source of spiritual health in
us.
2. MORALITY.
From the perplexities of religion many flee to morality as to something
secure and untouched by dissension. The position of morality is, indeed,
different from that of religion. Of atheists there are many; but there
are few, if any, who deny the validity of all moral values: that
fidelity is better than deceit, love better than hate, concerning this
there is no dispute. But it is a question how far this agreement extends
and how much we may gain from it. Within the same sphere of culture at
least it is with very little difficulty that we come to agreement in
respect of individual matters of morality; if ethical societies limited
themselves to practical morality, and did not at the same time wish to
settle questions of principle, they would find scarcely any opposition.
But, as soon as we comprehend the individual matters as a whole and ask
for a foundation for the whole, problem after problem makes its
appearance, and it soon becomes clear that we can neither establish nor
distinctively form morality without a conviction concerning life as a
whole and our fundamental relation to reality. If, therefore, there is
so much uncertainty in the present concerning life as a whole and our
fundamental relation to reality, we must inevitably become doubtful and
unclear with regard to morality. In fact, the position may be described
in this way: we lack a morality which has a secure basis and a definite
character; in morality, also, after-effects of the past mingle with the
impulses of the present; and we are accustomed to conceal the poverty
of our own possessions by historical knowledge and mere learning--so
much is this the case that we are able even in a state of disgraceful
poverty to think ourselves rich. There are no less than five types of
morality which seek our adherence and the guidance of our soul: we may
suppose that in each of these there is some truth, but no single one is
able to win our acceptance entirely; each leads to a certain point, and
then we recognise a limit. We have a religious morality, in which our
volition is related to and our destiny is determined by a divine power;
but this endangers the spiritual independence of man, and has a strong
tendency to make his life too passive; besides, in this case, the
prostration of religion also weakens the power of morality and its power
to direct life. We have a morality of culture, which directs all power
towards increasing the progress of humanity, and subordinates all
subjective preference to the requirements of an objective operation and
creation; but the ceaselessly increasing differentiation of work makes
this form of morality a danger to the soul as a whole; man is in danger
of being made a mere means and instrument of a soulless process of
culture. We have a social morality, which makes the welfare of society
the chief thing, and which, by strengthening the feeling of solidarity,
produces humane efforts in abundance, but is unable to include life as a
whole; in this form of morality there is a great danger of
overestimating external conditions of life, and of levelling and
weakening life. Certain great thinkers have advocated a morality of pure
reason, which elevates man above the sphere of the useful and the
pleasant; and gives to him an inner independence; but with all its
greatness this morality is too formal and too abstract for us; and,
besides, we lack to-day the certainty of an invisible world, which alone
can give a secure foundation to this type of morality. Lastly, we have
an individualistic morality, a morality of beautiful souls, which
regards the complete development of one's own particular nature, the
harmonious cultivation of the whole range of one's powers, as the aim
of conduct, but which not only necessitates individuals who are far
greater and far more characteristic in nature than we find in experience
in general, but also has little power to arouse us to effort, and, if
accepted exclusively, soon tends to degenerate into a refined
self-enjoyment and vain self-reflection.
The presence of all these tendencies and motives in morality subjects us
to-day to an abundance of ethical stimuli; but it does not give us an
ethic. At the most it conceals the fact that the multiplicity of
activities do not form for us a universal task, which could counteract
the separation into individuals, parties, particular departments, and
give us the consciousness of serving in our work aims that transcend the
well-being and preference of mere man. We are in need of a morality that
proceeds from our own life; and in this we need much more than we are
conscious of needing. For we have no universal aim that we might take up
in our disposition, and by which we might test all individual
activities; and so life must become disunified and inwardly alien; we
lose all spiritual relation to the world. The world surrounds us in the
first place as a dark and immovable fate; we do not make ourselves
masters of this fate, just because we give ourselves too much to do with
things. Rather, to accomplish this, we must transform reality from its
very foundation by our own activity and decision; we must wage war
against obscurity and irrationality, and this conflict must tend to
divide our whole existence into friend and enemy, good and evil, but
along with this first give to life complete activity, and lead it to
world-embracing greatness. Only in this way does man, from being simply
a spectator, become a co-operator in the building up of the world; only
thus does that which occurs within him become in the fullest sense his
own. Everything which obscures the ethical character of human life
involves, therefore, a loss in greatness and dignity; a degeneration to
a state of servitude, to being a mere part of an alien whole. Particular
parties may be in agreement with and find satisfaction in this
condition; humanity as a whole will not rest content with it. As
certainly as humanity confidently maintains that its life has meaning
and value, so certainly will it take up the problem of morality ever
anew against all attempted intimidation.
If to-day we are again to take up this problem, then in the first place
the conditions and the requirements of the problem must be quite clear.
We can never acquire a morality from the troubled confusion of social
life; on the contrary, morality involves a transcendence of this; it
necessitates distinctive convictions concerning the world as a whole and
our position in it. There is no independent morality, no morality in
itself; morality involves a fundamental whole of life, which is
appropriated in it and by this appropriation first attains to
perfection. In contrast to the existing condition of things a new
condition must first be raised in ideas that precede conduct. The new
condition acquires a moral character only through requiring on the one
hand moral freedom as opposed to the mechanism of natural impulse, on
the other a transcendent ideal in opposition to mere self-preservation.
These two together reveal a new order of things distinct from nature;
they must seem impossible from the point of view of the world of sense,
not only freedom with its apparent annulling of all connections, but
also the freeing of conduct from bondage to mere nature. For how would
one conceive an activity that did not tend ultimately to the good of the
agent, and so aid in his self-preservation? Does it not involve a
contradiction for him to exert his power for something alien to himself?
If in the present we feel such problems in the fullness of their force,
and if we must fight for morality as a whole, we must go back to the
foundations of our existence, and seek primarily for a secure position
in contrast with the instability of temporal experiences. In accordance
with the whole course of our investigation, we can find such a position,
and by further development a distinctive morality also, only in an
independent spiritual life, which first conducts the world to
self-consciousness and so to genuine reality. The two requirements
discussed above cause no difficulty from the point of view of an
independent spiritual life. We convinced ourselves in a previous section
of the reality of freedom in the spiritual life; in morality also
conduct can free itself from the natural _ego_ without degenerating into
a state of emptiness, because the spiritual life reveals a new and the
alone genuine self. Thus here activity is not spent upon something alien
to us, something presented to it from outside, but is within our own
being, which here, indeed, includes the whole infinity within it.
Activity in the spiritual life serves true self-preservation, which has
only the name in common with natural self-preservation.
Wherever it is acknowledged that the spiritual life involves a turning
of reality to complete independence and spontaneity, morality must take
a significant, indeed the central, position. For it is clear that only
the taking up in our own activity and conviction, only complete
appropriation, can bring life to the highest degree of perfection.
Morality does not find in existence a life-content which it must convey
to the individual subject, but is itself within the life-process; a
complete self-consciousness of the spiritual life is attained first in
morality, and morality must develop the content of that life. It is not
that man in morality turns toward the spiritual life, but that the
spiritual life elevates itself in the whole of its nature; all human
morality must have its basis in a morality of the spiritual life.